All Together Dead by Charlaine Harris

It becomes difficult to review a book when it is the seventh in a series. There are some things that can’t necessarily be explained to a reader who hasn’t picked up any of the books, like the desire to know how the characters will fare through this newest volume, or the desire to see how the balance between resistance and advancement plays out.

 

There’s more to this book than a glittery cover. There are vampires, once strong, brought down by the chaotic power of a hurricane. There is Sookie, a humble southern mind reader, swept up with vampires who are real people to her, occasionally forgetting that they are different, alien, even occasionally monstrous. There’s the queen of Louisiana herself, her kingdom broken by first a vampire war, then a storm that devastated human and vampire residents alike. There’s a wild card, a danger that no one thought about, that no one expected, standing right in plain sight before both the characters’ and the readers’ eyes.

 

The Sookie books have always been part stubborn will, part sass. They’ve always been shot through with serious plot threads. But in this latest one the danger isn’t just to Sookie’s mind, heart or libido. The danger is very real, and will change not just the humans touched by it, but will affect the vampires as well.

 

I’ve enjoyed reading how Sookie grows, and does so without gaining a power a book. I like these books because the vampires aren’t all progressively one upping each other with supernatural, or political powers. The werewolves aren’t extra from a BDSM movie. And Sookie herself is both strong and weak, a woman who can’t bring herself to be cruel like the people around her, nor can she sit back and let people who have mistreated her die when she can help.

 

Even if I did read it in six hours, it was still worth the hardback cover price and I have faith that the next one will be as well.